Cuban Pilot Defects With 33 Others in a Daring Helicopter Flight

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In a daring escape from one of the world's last remaining Communist nations, a pilot for the Cuban national airline commandeered a helicopter in Havana today and flew 33 relatives and friends to a small suburban airport here.

The group, which included nine children and infants, immediately requested political asylum and was taken to an Immigration and Naturalization Service detention center here to be processed.

"We just could not stand it there anymore," one female passenger said shortly after landing at Tamiami Airport, a small strip south of Miami normally used by pleasure craft and other small planes. 'I Truly Feel Complete'

"Do you have any idea what it is like to be able to bring out four children and my grandchildren like this?" asked another passenger, who identified herself as Maria Lopez. "Now I truly feel complete."

Immigration officials said they expected all 34 Cuban refugees to be released quickly to their relatives here, perhaps as early as this weekend. Unlike people from Haiti and other Latin American countries, Cubans are eligible for a special immigration program that grants them legal residency in the United States in little more than a year.

More than 7,000 Haitians, for example, are currently being detained at a United States military base at Guantanamo, Cuba, while American courts decide if they can be forcibly repatriated to their homeland, a policy favored by the Bush Administration.

The Haitian exodus began after a military regime overthrew an elected civilian president last fall, but Washington, which has refused to recognize the new government, says it nonetheless regards the Haitians as economic, rather than political, refugees. Based at Cuban Resort

The leader of today's mass defection was identified as German Pompa, a pilot with Cubana Airlines who also holds the rank of lieutenant in the Cuban Air Force. Mr. Pompa was based in Varadero, a beach resort east of Havana catering to foreign tourists and members of the Communist Party elite, and regularly flew visitors and officials on helicopter excursions from the local airport.

Orestes Lorenzo Perez, a former Cuban military pilot who defected to the United States last year and said he had once been Mr. Pompa's commanding officer, talked to Mr. Pompa minutes after his arrival this morning. Mr. Perez said Mr. Pompa told him he went to the Varadero airport early this morning and boarded the craft. Mr. Pompa was accompanied, he said, by two friends who wore the uniforms of crew members so that the suspicions of airport security officers would not be aroused.

"They then flew to a prearranged spot nearby, where family members and friends were waiting," Mr. Perez said. "The passengers climbed on board in a hurry, and they flew off, keeping an altitude of less than 30 feet above the water so that the Cuban Air Force would not detect them and shoot them down."

United States Customs Service officials said a "slow, low-flying object" was first detected flying over the Straits of Florida shortly after 8 A.M. Two Government airplanes sent to intercept the aircraft quickly identified it as a Russian-made MI-8 helicopter, and accompanied the craft until it touched down around 9:15. New Year's Greetings

"The first thing he said to me was, 'Happy New Year,' " said Sebastian Ortega, a customs official who was in radio contact with Mr. Pompa during the flight. "Other than that we didn't do very much talking. We just wanted to make sure we got him down on the ground safe and sound."

Late this morning some small plastic flight bags that the passengers brought with them, including one that proclaimed "Cuba Awaits You," were still on board the helicopter as it sat on the tarmac at Tamiami Airport, with customs agents and Miami police officers guarding it.

Under the terms of an international air hijacking agreement that both the United States and Cuba have signed, the helicopter must be returned to Cuba. A spokesman for the Cuban Interests Section in Washington said this afternoon that the Cuban Government expected to send a crew to Florida to pick up the craft and fly it back to Havana as soon as arrangements could be made.

Inside the commandeered helicopter were seats for three crew members and seat belts for 18 passengers, indicating that the craft made its 200-mile journey dangerously overloaded.

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"I was a little bit nervous in the beginning," said one of the passengers, a man in his 30's. "But after 30 minutes I knew we were out of danger."

Mr. Perez and other friends of the passengers said today's escape had been carefully planned for several weeks and that there had been at least one attempted escape that was aborted at the last moment. Shortly after their arrival several of the passengers used mobile telephones to call relatives in Miami, and their conversations made it clear that those family members also knew that some sort of escape effort was in the works.

As news of the helicopter flight spread on Spanish-language radio and television stations here, curious Cuban-Americans drove to the airport in the hope of catching a glimpse of the latest additions to Miami's flourishing exile community and the craft in which they escaped.

"The next thing you know, they will be coming in submarines," said one radio commentator, rejoicing that "once again the Cuban people have made a fool of Fidel Castro."

Today's flight to freedom comes amid Cuba's worst economic and political crisis since Mr. Castro seized power 33 years ago this month. Deprived of subsidies, oil and markets for its sugar exports as a result of the collapse of Communism in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, the Cuban economy has over the last two years sunk virtually to a subsistence level.

Food and fuel have long been rationed, but new restrictions on electricity and gasoline consumption, including the elimination of many bus lines, went into effect on Jan. 1. Television, newspapers, movie theaters and sports arenas have also cut back their operations, leaving the population with little diversion during what Mr. Castro calls a "special period" that he has admitted will intensify this year. 'No Freedom of Expression'

At the same time, state security has stepped up its vigilance. "There is no freedom of expression there," one of the passengers on the helicopter, a teen-ager, told reporters today. "The minute you say something they throw you in jail."

In the first nine months of 1991 more than 2,000 Cubans fled to Florida aboard rafts, inner tubes or small boats, compared with 467 during the previous year, according to the immigration agency. The State Department says an additional 30,000 Cubans arrived in the United States to visit relatives and are believed by the United States authorities here to have overstayed their visas.

In a desperate attempt to flee the island just last week, an unknown Havana resident hooked a trapeze-like device to the wing of a charter flight leaving the Havana airport for Miami. As passengers watched helplessly, the man lost consciousness and fell from his perch into the sea shortly after takeoff.

Last March, Mr. Perez, flying a supersonic MIG-27 jet fighter, landed at a United States naval air station just north of Key West. That defection raised questions about the efficiency of the Pentagon's air defense network.

This time, however, the helicopter, which has a maximum speed of about 150 knots, was spotted soon after it left Havana. Michael Sheehan, a spokesman for the Customs Service in Miami, said two aircraft based at Homestead Air Force Base south of here were then ordered into the air, and spotted the helicopter about 20 miles south of Marathon, in the Florida Keys.

Customs officials said tail markings indicating the craft belonged to Cuba's state airline and the absence of guns quickly made it clear to them that they were dealing with a mass defection.

"We had no reason to believe this group was hostile," said the customs agent who piloted the Citation jet that intercepted the helicopter and accompanied it to the airstrip.

The pilot, who spoke on condition that he not be named, added: "As we approached we could see the people inside, smiling and waving at us. When they landed they were even more excited. It looked like they were kissing the ground."

A version of this article appears in print on January 4, 1992, on Page 1001006 of the National edition with the headline: Cuban Pilot Defects With 33 Others in a Daring Helicopter Flight. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe